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Renaat
My
Grandfather
and me
My
sisters, mom
and me
Me
with a early
carving
Renaat
Marchand
My
Dad
The
Green Man
Ivory
Billed
Woodpecker
Arno
& Dana
Arno
& Dana
Renaat
Marchand
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Born
in Belgium, March 29 1962. Aries, stubborn?
For the Belgian people, don’t get me wrong but I always
felt that I had to leave some day.
Restless mind.
Wondering how to get the most out of life.
A life long challenge.
In
honor to my father, who left us way too soon, I now live
a quality life because I did find my way without him and
because of him. In those short 15 years I learned to love
people around me. He showed me to respect nature, his passion
for music and the way he expressed himself through painting
and story. His excitement and energy were addictive. Photography
was our way to shoot nice memories. He was a man respected
by many. Pictures and nice memories is what I have. Hector
didn’t live a healthy life, with lots of career stress,
no time for himself, minimal time with his kids but did
he ever leave an impression behind.All he did was mainly
for his family, to give them what he never had. Later on
taken away from us.
He
didn’t show me how to use a gun, how to be miserable
or how to hate.
Love and humor make things much easier.
Picking a wildflower makes me feel guilty…
Mother nature was our religion, no gods were mentioned in
our house.
The
Old Belgians were very green and energetic people until
Christianity canned it all. Celtic roots are still strong
and living this close to nature makes me realize that we
are all loosing touch with our natural surroundings. Nature
strange. We are the biggest destroyers, killing species
that we didn’t even discover yet. The green man is
watching you…
The
biggest news for me to date in the last eight years was
when they rediscovered an extinct species. The Ivory Billed
Woodpecker,similar then the one here, the Pileated woodpecker
or the Black Woodpecker in Europe.
He’s still around.
Mom
is still around, bitter and still not accepting my decision
to live a better and more intense life.
“It’s better to have a far away and happy son
than one who’s close by and grumpy.”
Moved to British Columbia in April 2000.
Quit
smoking the first day in Canada on April 7.
As parents we have a huge responsibility, great influence
in how we deal with things in life.
Strong, relying on my head and hands we made the move. Krista,
my life long friend since 1977 and two wonderful kids came
along. Arno and Dana are no longer kids anymore and are
making our lives so meaningful and rich.
We all found our way here.
Thanks to all those wonderful people who helped us paddle
upstream to where we are now. Close to paradise, endangered
by developments and people who don’t care.
Don’t care about our long vision future and only care
about fake now happine$$. I am scared.
They picture Canada as pristine back in Europe.
Beautiful flyers.
But; Grizzlies get shot by trophy hunters, yes by Europeans
too, cougars hunted, hundreds of animals are still trapped,
wolves poisoned, old growth forests are still being cut
down for export.
Lets hope this will stop soon because it hurts.
Healthy,
fit and rich as we are, we do everything we can to lead
by example.
Finding a balance in work and pleasure. Training for our
triathlons, which we started doing a couple of years ago.
What a great feeling to cross the line.
Just me, competing with me.
Bird
watching keeps me on my toes and in contact with our natural
environment.
Observing a beautiful Warbler really makes my day. Moths
and spiders are safe with me. I wish to have my old bird
watching friends here with me to watch over my shoulder.
I do miss you guys!
The Bald Eagle flying over my head sees that we are doing
all right, could this be my dad…?
I do wave when nobody’s around…
Thanks
dad
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